Bitcoin has stormed into the second quarter of 2026, adding almost 30% since crashing to its recent low of $60,000 as traders await Elon Musk’s imminent game-changer.
Sign up now for —A free crypto newsletter that will get you ahead of the market
The bitcoin price is fast approaching $80,000 per bitcoin, though it remains well off its $126,000 2025 peak (even as a former Federal Reserve chair stokes hyperinflation fears).
Now, as a $6.2 trillion earthquake is hurtling toward bitcoin, Michael Saylor’s Strategy has flipped BlackRock as the largest institutional holder of bitcoin for the first time since 2024—while data has revealed the largest bitcoin holders are buying at their fastest pace in over a year.
Sign up now for the free —A daily five-minute newsletter for traders, investors and the crypto-curious that will get you up to date and keep you ahead of the bitcoin price and crypto market swings
This week, Strategy, the bitcoin acquisition vehicle, bought just over 34,000 bitcoin for $2.5 billion, its third-largest purchase on record, pushing it to a total bitcoin stack of 815,00.
Strategy’s latest bitcoin buy saw the company top BlackRock’s IBIT bitcoin fund, which holds almost 803,000 bitcoin on behalf of investors, for the first time since the second quarter of 2024.
“Bitcoin prices and funding rates are diverging,” Vetle Lunde head of research at K33, wrote in an emailed note, pointing to Strategy and bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) buying just over 56,000 bitcoin in the past week, “yet the price response has been relatively muted.”
Sign up now for —A free crypto newsletter that will get you ahead of the market
“While bitcoin trends higher, funding continues to fall, with seven-day rates on par with February lows alongside rising open interest," Lunde said.
“This setup increases the likelihood and potential magnitude of a short squeeze … we continue to view $60,000 as the likely low for this drawdown and see higher highs as the more probable path ahead.”
Meanwhile, bitcoin holders classified as “whales”—those holding between 100 and 10,000 bitcoin—bought some 45,000 bitcoin over the last week, the largest single-week accumulation since July 2025, according to data from bitcoin and crypto exchange Cex.IO and reported by Bitcoin Magazine.
"It’s time," veteran macro investor and bitcoin price bull Dan Tapiero, who last year consolidated his two equity funds 10T and 1RT as 50T, posted to X, suggesting the bitcoin price is poised for a break out move.